It's Not Worth It

Drano7463 opened one eye, and then shut it again as a wave
of harsh sunlight flooded into the room. He began counting under his breath.

"One… two… three… four…" There was muffled banging
from the next room.

"Five… six… seven…" A door burst open.

"Eight…" And then slammed shut.

"Nine…" Drano's bedroom door was flung violently
open.

"Ten."

"Oh Brootheeeeer!"

Sighing, Drano sat up in bed and squinted across
the room at Stardust3974, his younger sister.

"Morning," he said.

"Morning to you too!" The red Usul bounced up
and down on the threshold. "It is eight-oh-clock, you know."

The red Draik rolled his eyes. "Soooo?"

Stardust took a deep breath. Drano clamped his
paws over his ears.

"IT IS A GREAT DAY TODAY, BROTHER!" proclaimed
the Usul as loudly as possible.

"And why is…" Drano was cut off mid query as
from below the following came:

"CUT the noise, kids, per-LEASE!"

"Sorry, Mum!" called Drano and Stardust in unison.
Stardust giggled, then scurried out the room and down the stairs.

"Hey, Sis, wait!" Drano hurried out the room
after her. Then he hurried back in, yanked open the window and darted back out.
There was a thump as he hit the floor at the bottom of the stairs, then all
was quiet.

A Yullie stirred in its bed as clean morning
air drifted into the room.

Down in the kitchen…

"So, Star," said Drano, as he took his porridge
from the stove and sat down at the table, "what is so great about today?"

"You should know," replied his sister, idly flicking
through the Neopian Times.

"But I don't, Dust, and I want you to tell me!"

"You would like me to tell you?"

"Yes!"

"Okay then…" Stardust paused, sighed, and ate
a mouthful of her breakfast before speaking. Drano fidgeted.

"Well, Bro," began Stardust at last, "it is EXACTLY
six weeks until your birthday." She giggled.

Drano snorted in irritation. "But that's ages
away!"

"Uh, uh." The Usul shook her head.

"Is."

"Isn't."

"Is."

"Not to all those poor people who have to plan
ahead for presents." Star nodded wisely. "It could take years for Mum to save
up for whatever you want. What do you want anyway?"

"I hadn't really thought about it," said Drano
lightly.

"Oh yeah?" Stardust raised her eyebrows.

"No," admitted her brother.

"What do you want then?"

Drano shook his head. "Too expensive."

Stardust pouted. "Have it your way then. Don't
get what you really really want. Like I care."

They finished their breakfast in silence. Drano
went to feed his petpet. Stardust read a short article in the Times, and then
retreated to the bathroom.

At nine am sharp they met up again in the study,
the boy's Yullie trailing at his heels and the girl cradling several plushie
miniatures of herself.

They seated themselves and waited for their mother
to turn up and begin today's lesson. Drano thought impatiently of TNT's promise
of a school.

Soon their mother entered, smelling tantalisingly
of the outdoors and the Swab Bushes. She selected some books from the nearest
shelf, and then joined them on the seats.

"To start off, we will do some maths," she announced.

Drano groaned, but his sister hastily arranged
the plushies on the seat beside her before leaning forward, attentive.

At "break" time, Stardust grinned through a mouthful
of Triple Carrot Sandwich and nudged Drano. He looked up from secreting his
Yullie part of his Cheese Sandwich and raised his eyebrows quizzically.

Their mother, who had been watching Drano's secretive
movements for minutes now, also looked at his sister.

Stardust chewed frantically, swallowed, and then
said, "Erm, Bro, what did you say you wanted for your birthday?"

"I didn't say," said Drano, cautiously. It was
obvious what she was doing; she was bringing up the subject now just so that
their mum would hear and perhaps make Drano say what it was he wanted but was
keeping so quiet about.

"You should say," said Stardust. "Why don't you?"

"I told you! It is way too expensive."

"Come on, Drano, we might as well hear it," said
his mother.

Drano lowered his sandwich in reach of the Yullie
as it climbed on to his lap.

"Okay…" Drano paused. He took a breath and said
in a rush, "What I'd REALLY like is a Royal Paint Brush."

His family exchanged glances.

"I know it's too much NP," added Drano, and looked
down at his sandwich. The item was now devoid of cheese.

"Well, it is a bit…" his mother ended the sentence
half-finished.

"That WOULD take years," commented Stardust,
her eyes tracking the Yullie as it hid under Drano's chair.

"Thought so," said he, pretending not to be bothered.
If only Dust hadn't made him say! He wouldn't have been disappointed that way.

There was a short silence.

"Where's my petpet gone?" asked the Draik.

Drano opened one eye, and then shut it again
as a wave of harsh sunlight flooded into the room. He began counting under his
breath.

"One… two… three… four…" No muffled banging came
to his hearing.

"Five… six… seven…" He strained his ears. Nothing.

"Eight…" Still nothing. He carried on just for
the sake of it now, totally puzzled.

"Nine…

"Ten…"

"Oh brootheeeeer!" screeched Stardust from the
bottom of the stairs.

The Draik leapt off the bed and careened out
the room and along the corridor. He stopped at the top and peered down the dimly
lit stairway.

"Are you all right, Sis?" asked he.

"Good morning to you two!" The Usul flicked her
tail. "Of course I'm not all right. I'm even left-pawed; how can you think I'm
ALL right?"

"But are you?"

"Yes, thank you."

"Good. Move aside then, I'm coming down."

Stardust didn't budge. "Window," she said imperiously.

"Oh yeah." Drano trotted back to his room and
dutifully opened his window.

He hit the floor with a thud, and then hopped
backwards onto the first step as his mother rushed by, looking for all the world
as though she were about to go out. Out farther than the Swab Bushes, Drano
corrected himself.

"In a hurry, Mum?"

"Just going to Central to pick up some groceries,"
she explained.

"Which might take a while as the shop is always
so full at this hour," added Stardust, sauntering into the corridor, also looking
ready to take leave of the neohome.

"Uh, okay," said Drano. So many habits being
broken in one morning, he thought; Mum never goes shopping on a Friday.
"And you're going too, Sis?" he asked.

"Yes…" she paused as her brother raised his eyebrows
in disbelief. "I'm only going because I want to nip in the toyshop."

"What about lessons?" asked Drano, perplexed.

"We'll shift them into the later hours," decided
his mum. "Okay, Honey? We won't be TOO long."

"Okay, that's fine." He grinned to cover his
expression of bewilderment.

"Let's go then!" squeaked Stardust. There was
a rush of air, and then they were gone.

Drano blinked, and scratched his head. Weird…

A familiar thop, thop, thop, thop noise penetrated
his thoughts. He turned to see his petpet laboriously descending from the first
floor, thopping down onto each step.

"Good show, Soldier," he said, "Work that cheese
off."

The Yullie paused half way and gave him a Look.

Chuckling, Drano made his way to the kitchen
and prepared himself some cereal. As he got the milk from the fridge, he noted
the profusion of vegetables therein. He frowned, memories of when he used to
play at being a detective drifting up from the bottom of his mind; it was a
clue.

Having devoured his breakfast in thoughtful silence,
Drano fetched a Yellow Lined Notepad and a Blue Draik Pencil from his room and
returned to the table, where the Yullie was thoroughly cleaning his bowl for
him.

The Draik removed it and the bowl from the tabletop,
and then gave the mouse-like creature its own food. He then seated himself and
placed the notepad on the wooden surface. The pencil-tip hovered in the air
above it for a moment, before Drano wrote the following:

CLUES

1) Mum went shopping for groceries when there
was none needed. Star went with her.

He surveyed the kitchen meditatively. Everything
was as it should be, as far as he could tell. Apart from behind the fridge door,
though that was as it should be really. It was his mother that wasn't.

"Time for an investigation, I think," announced
he, "Will you help me track out clues, little cute petpet?"

The little cute petpet Looked up at him.

"You will? How I thank you for your generosity!"
Drano pocketed his notepad and pencil, scooped up the reluctant Yullie and started
a full-scale examination of the premises.

Drano sat down on the lawn. His search had not
revealed much, but there was one thing…

2) Mum left in such a hurry she didn't water
the potted plants.

He did have a faint inkling at the back of his
mind that would explain why they would pretend to be going shopping and in fact
be going somewhere totally different, like to a Game…

Drano suddenly scrambled to his feet, dislodging
the petpet who had been spread-eagled across his lap. It looked up at him reproachfully.

"Sorry," said Drano, picking it up and making
for the house, "The plan now is, Cutey, that you stay here and cover for me,
while I take a trip into town. You will do that for me, yes? Thank you!"

After depositing the petpet on his bed, he broke
into his sister's room and rummaged in the dressing-up chest, withdrawing eventually
some pieces of clothing that were not pink or yellow. Then he made his exit,
on the way grabbing an Apple from the kitchen and, along with his notepad and
pencil, stowing them away in a large pocket.

The double NP game this day was Pterattack, which,
sadly, neither Stardust nor her Mum were very handy at. But they had a go, flying
the little Pteri through the canyon and blasting down any monsters that tried
to stand in their way.

Later, as they left the Game, a mysterious watcher
in a large coat and floppy hat heard the Usul say: "Well, 4304np isn't bad considering
how many times you crashed into the wall."

The other made a face and replied: "Cheeky. How
many times did you get eaten by the big red monster exactly, Hon?"

Stardust shrugged, "Who cares? Come on, let's
get back before Bro starts wondering why we are being so long!"

Drano turned and hurried along a series of shortcuts,
suddenly concerned that he might not get home ahead of them.

Drano had just replaced the disguise in Stardust's
room when the front door banged open and the Usul charged in, followed at a
more respectful speed by her mother.

Drano went down to greet them, saying: "Hi, Mum,
Sis. I noticed earlier we didn't actually need any veg; the fridge is full…"
he glanced around at the lack of shopping bags, "Which maybe you remembered?"

"Uh, no. Is it really full? Gosh, good thing
we… er… "

"Good thing the shop was shut," put in Stardust.
"They were taking in a delivery," she added.

"So why did you take so long?" asked Drano, faking
a look of puzzlement.

"The TOY SHOP was open!" Stardust said.

"And you know how long a 'nip' is in there,"
agreed her mother.

"And we popped to the National Neopian on the
way home," said Stardust, now enjoying herself immensely.

"You weren't worried, were you?" asked their
mother, perhaps attempting to halt the Usul's embroidering before it got out
of hand.

"No, not really," Drano shook his head, "I DO
know how long a "nip" is in the toy shop."

"Good. Well, we better get on and do some lessons,
hadn't we?"

Drano rolled out of bed and landed with a loud
thump on the floor, where he lay for some time, listening. There were kitchen
noises coming from the kitchen, but apart from that the only sound in the whole
house was that of his Yullie snoring.

Drano stood, opened the window, and then receded
from the room with a very thoughtful and slightly amused expression on his dragonish
features.

As he entered the kitchen: "Where is Stardust?"

"Out," replied his mother, "A friend came round
earlier to inform her of The Last Smiley's appearance as the double NP game."

"Ah." Drano sat down at the table. He was well
aware of his sister's obsession with smiley "emoticons" and suchlike, and the
day The Last Smiley had been released… well; she had been overly excited to
say the least. As the Draik ate, he became aware that his mum was hovering,
on the verge of saying something but not quite ready to.

He looked up. "You okay?"

"Yes, yes." She went over and inspected the Insect
Eating House Plant.

Drano shrugged to himself and returned to his
food. Then he remembered something. "Oh, Mum?"

"Yeah, Hon?"

"Did you neomail Three-Legs to tell him I'd decided
to practice with the sword today?"

"Um, weeeeell…" She paused, and then said quickly,
"I was actually thinking maybe you should take a break from training, kind of."

"Uh," Drano raised his eyebrows and tried to
think of something to say, "Uh… whyyyy?"

"Well, you know, you practice every week and
that is good and all, but I thought perhaps a break would help, you know, like
you'd benefit from the rest and then you'd be really ready to do something difficult
next time… or something. Would that be okay?"

"I suppose," repeated Drano.

"Don't look so downhearted! You'll still have
a good day! You could go out and play with your friends, or play with your petpet,
or…"

"Yeah, I'll do that," said Drano, abruptly rising
from the table and vanishing into the hall.

As he arrived in the room, his Yullie wriggled
its nose and looked at him.

"I'm not really going to play with you," said
Drano, tickling the petpet between the ears, "I must keep up training, whether
on Krawk Island or elsewhere!" He reached under his bed and retrieved his second
most prized possession: a Silver Draik Sword. The first most prized was of course
his nameless Yullie.

"Though," added he, a tinge of uncertainty in
his voice, "Where 'elsewhere' might be I have not a clue."

His gaze wandered idly about the room, eventually
settling on the Yellow Lined Notepad that lay forgotten on his desk. A clue?
He sat down at the desk and picked up his pencil.

3) Mum didn't want me to go to the academy for
training.

"Because…" said Drano out loud. "Because what,
Fluffball?"

The Yullie blinked.

"Because… Mum is saving up," said the Draik,
"for?"

The Yullie put its head on one side.

"My birthday. For my birthday."

The Yullie curled up and went back to sleep.

"So," said Drano, disregarding his uninterested
audience. "So she has to save the money she uses for my weekly dubloon. So she
has to take regular trips to the Games. So who knows what else?

"Though even with all that I don't see how she
can save up for a Royal Paint Brush in only SIX WEEKS! What if she's saving
for a less expensive paintbrush? What if I get all excited over a paintbrush-shaped
parcel on my birthday and it turns out it isn't the one I wanted all my life?"

Drano sighed and flopped onto his unmade bed.
"If this, if that. I'm not as sure of the situation as I thought I was, Oh My
Splurgey Little Petpet."

The sleeping Yullie made no response.

The next money-saving incident occurred that
afternoon. Stardust was back home, and was engrossed with her plushie Usuls
in her bedroom. Drano was in his room, reading Popular Draik Names, hoping to
find that his name was one of the more unusual ones.

His mother had knocked on his door.

"Yeah?"

"Hi, Hon," she had said, entering and holding
up a cardboard box, "Stacy-next-door and her kids are selling the old toys in
their front garden. And she said if I had anything I wanted to get rid of I
could come round, use one of her tables as a stall and benefit from the crowd
at her place. So the question is have you got any old stuff you never use any
more?"

Drano had gone back to his book when she had
left, but soon he found he could not keep his thoughts off "the case". Though,
seeing as he had practically solved it already, it wasn't a "case," as such,
anymore.

"So that was 'what else' she was going to do
to save up," said the Draik to himself, inadvertently awakening his petpet.

It looked over at him from where it lay on his
bed.

"I do hope she's not going to stop me going to
The Academy for all the weeks leading up to you-know-when. What do you think,
Fluffy?"

The Yullie rolled onto its back like a dog.

"YOU need a name, don't ya, Cheese Scoffer?"
The reason it had never been given a name was because whatever Drano tried (be
it "Mousy," "Cream Coat," "Daisy," or "Pig-like Gnawing Rats' Spawn") it just
didn't answer to. It never paid any attention when called anything, other than
giving the caller a Look. AND they didn't know whether it was male or female.
Drano tended to refer to it as a "he," but visitors usually assumed the Yullie
to be a "she" because of its brightly colored fur.

The Yullie gazed up at him defiantly.

"Don't you want a name?" asked Drano.

The Yullie blinked.

"Maybe I'm just not picking the right name,"
mused the Draik, "Maybe you do have one, but we just haven't thought of it yet.
Is that it?"

The Yullie blinked.

Drano sighed. "This is useless. Back to work,
I think." He picked up his pad and pencil and headed to his sister's room.

When he knocked on the door…

"Yes?"

He entered, "Hello, Star, I was wondering if…"

"I don't do interviews," said Stardust, backing
out of her toy-cupboard and narrowing her eyes at him.

"How did you know what I was going to ask you?"

"'Hello, Star, I was wondering…!'" mimicked the
Usul. "That's what you always used to say when you were being a detective!"

"Oh."

"'Oh' is right. Now be off." She dived back into
the cupboard.

"But…" began Drano.

"'But…!'" interrupted Star, "NOTHING! Do you
want me to call the police?"

"Now, calm down, Miss," soothed the Draik. "No
need to panic, it's only a few questions."

"No."

"Please, you do want me to get to the bottom
of this, don't you? Just a little cooperation on your part could work wonders
and…"

"What do you need to know?" asked Stardust doubtfully,
poking her head out.

"Thank y…"

"I haven't answered anything yet! Now get on
with it before I change my mind!"

Drano sighed inaudibly: Stardust, the ever-unwilling
citizen who always seems to know some vital fact. "Well, Miss, if you could
kindly tell me where you were this very morning at half past eight…"

"I was playing The Last Smiley."

"And where were you the morn before that?"

"Nipping in the toyshop."

"I see. May I ask if you purchased anything?"

"You may. I didn't, however; I was after a Blue
Xweetok Plushie, but the restockers made an amazingly fast dash as soon as it
was put on the shelves."

"Stardust?" said Drano, sitting down on the end
of her bed.

"Yes?"

"This isn't going to be nice if you have to play
games for more than enjoyment and I can't go to The Academy."

His sister flopped out of the cupboard onto the
floor. "I know."

"What are we going to do?"

"How do you mean? What can we do?"

"I don't know, but it is just not worth it, all
this sneaking off to the Games."

"I know," repeated Stardust, "and it won't work.
I made some rough calculations; we won't have enough NP in time."

"How much would you have to make a day?" asked
Drano.

"Well, I didn't work it out that specific." Stardust
ran over to her desk and grabbed her calculator. "Six weeks is forty-two days,
and the Royal Paint Brush (this I got from some person who was selling one)
is one million seven hundred and fifty thousand, which, divided by forty-two,
is forty-one thousand six hundred and sixty-six."

Drano whistled. "I TOLD you it was too expensive,"
said he, grinning.

Stardust giggled. "So… so what do we… what do
we do, Bro?" she asked, trying to control laughter.

"I haven't yet a plan. But," said the Draik,
"I will shortly." He settled down to think.

The Yullie entered the room and scampered over
to him.

"Hello, Nameless," said Drano.

Stardust shook her head. "Really, Brother, the
poor petpet has no name."

"I don't believe it wants one. Do you, My Little
Yullie?"

The Yullie pricked up its ears and looked at
him; it ran round in circles on his lap a few times and then tried to lick his
nose.

"Aaah," crooned Drano.

"Its name," said Stardust slowly, "is Yullie.
Isn't it, Yullie?"

The petpet suddenly bolted away from its owner
and landed in Stardust's arms, squeaking.

"Wow," said Drano, and paused. "You're right.
Yullie the Yullie."

Back in his room, Drano eyed his Yellow Lined
Notebook. It now read:

CLUES

1) Mum went shopping for groceries when there
was none needed. Star went with her.

2) Mum left in such a hurry she didn't water
the potted plants.

3) Mum didn't want me to go to the academy for
training

4) Mum is joining in the garden sale.

5) Miss Stardust has been interviewed and has
admitted to her deeds.

CASE SOLVED

"But Determined-Mum problem is yet to be," murmured
the Draik.

Drano opened one eye, and then shut it again
as a wave of harsh sunlight flooded into the room. He began counting under his
breath.

"One… two… three… four…" There was muffled banging
from the next room.